Why I’m giving up reading books by white men

A few years ago I had a meeting with a black novelist about diversity in publishing. He came to the offices of Unbound, the crowdfunding publisher I run.

When he arrived I felt suddenly uncomfortable about the whiteness of the staff in our office – we had just moved in and I realised he was the only person of colour who had been in our office who was not there to clean.

I was embarrassed to be in an industry stuck in the 1950s that may as well have “whites only” signs outside each of the main office buildings. In publishing as a whole, around 90 per cent of workers consider themselves “white British”.

As CEO of Unbound I had a position of authority in publishing, so I wanted to do something about it, but didn’t know what.

My responsibility

I thought he might be able to help me – I thought he might be able to help me because he was black. I felt there was some knowledge that being black gave him access to and that it was impossible for me, as a white person, to understand. I could have asked an Asian author too. Anyone who had some experience of books who was not a white person would have done.

I knew I was on dodgy ground even at the time, and I’m wincing writing this now, but it’s true. I could tell he had had similar conversations with people like me before, but he didn’t call me out on it. I was ashamed of having to have the meeting, I suppose.

But dealing with my own failings of running a publishing company that only had white staff, and published 99 per cent white people, was more important to me than accidentally revealing myself as racist to a black man.

It was a close run thing. I nearly didn’t do it. “Not being racist” was a key part of my white identity. Up until then I felt I had achieved it by not actually having to do anything. Testing it publicly might show that I was racist without me realising it, and that was a frightening possibility.

Authentic words

I tried to be honest with him about why we had not employed any people of colour. I trotted out something about authenticity. I thought that might account for why an office of white people had accidentally only ever hired white people. It wasn’t conscious, I said. We weren’t bad people. We just had a bias without realising it.

Rather than join my awkward attempt to avoid falling into the hole of racism I didn’t realise I was already sitting in, he told me a few anecdotes.

When he was young he didn’t think bookshops were for him because none of the books he could find were written by black men. Until Yardie, the novel by Victor Headley, came out.

Even now, every time he goes to an awards ceremony or publishing event he finds himself on a table full of people who are not white. “It’s like they have to put all of us on one table,” he said. “They are terrified of us spreading out.”

Dealing with my own failings of running a publishing company that only had white staff was more important to me than accidentally revealing myself as racist to a black man

In the rare interviews he gets he is always asked about his book “in the context of being a black man”, which is not a question a white novelist is ever asked. “Initiatives” about diversity are usually only done so the publisher can put out a press release to prove they’re doing something about diversity.

They seem to think that does the trick. But what it shows is that they care more about being seen to care about diversity than doing anything about it.

He also said that diversity in publishing is worse now than 20 years ago when he started writing. Worse. Last year I spoke to someone I know who is unusual in being a senior non-white woman in publishing. She also said it was worse now than when she started 20 years ago, and that one of the reasons she came back to work after having children was because if she hadn’t, there would be no one senior where she worked who was not white.

A low bar

It is 2018. How can an industry that exists to spread ideas and tell stories still have this problem?

Unbound has made a bit of progress in the diversity of our staff and in what we publish, but we deserve no applause for doing more than most publishers. As you can see, it’s a very low bar.

It would have been easier for me not to write this. For a start, I didn’t want to be seen as a white middle-class man writing about the problem of diversity in publishing. I thought that surely someone who wasn’t white should do it instead.

But that is precisely the problem. Perhaps you can be a white, middle-class man, run a publishing company, and talk about publishing’s lack of diversity. I hope so.

I was embarrassed to be in an industry stuck in the 1950s that may as well have “whites only” signs outside each of the main office buildings

It has taken me a few years, but I’ve realised that the “not being racist” part of my whiteness requires you actually to do something – assuming you have the power to do something. If you work in publishing, and hire, or publish anyone, then you have the power to do something.

You have to do something, even if doing so means you have to admit you are in a hole of racism. I’m still trying to climb out of that hole myself – it’s OK to be in that hole, just as long as you are trying to get out of it.

The problem comes when you are incapable of acknowledging you’re in this hole in the first place.

Dan Kieran is the CEO of Unbound, the world’s first crowdfunding publisher. His new book, The Surfboard, is being published via Unbound

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